Sunday papers – 30 April 2017

Nuttall

Our leader Paul Nuttall has announced where he’ll be standing in the General Election on the Ukipwebsite.

UKIP Leader Paul Nuttall has announced that he will be standing in Boston and Skegness in the forthcoming General Election.Paul said: “It is a great honour and a privilege to stand for UKIP in Boston and Skegness. The constituency voted overwhelmingly for Leave inspired in part by the massive betrayal of our fishing industry by successive Governments, something that today’s Conservative Party led by Theresa May looks set to repeat.“I will make it my mission to stand up for the people of Boston and Skegness and ensure there is no backsliding on Brexit.”

Ukip’s leader Paul Nuttall has confirmed he will stand for MP in the general election in the seat of Boston and Skegness.The constituency includes some of the strongest Leave-supporting areas in the country at last year’s EU referendum.Mr Nuttall described it as “a great honour and a privilege” to be standing for Ukip in the seat, adding: “The constituency voted overwhelmingly for Leave, inspired in part by the massive betrayal of our fishing industry by successive governments, something that today’s Conservative Party, led by Theresa May, looks set to repeat.“I will make it my mission to stand up for the people of Boston and Skegness and ensure there is no backsliding on Brexit.”

Brexit

Theresa May has been warned she could face a fresh court challenge over Brexit, after a retired Scottish doctor claimed the law requires there to be a second referendum on any withdrawal agreement.Dr Andrew Watt, a former radiologist from Glasgow, sent a letter before action – usually the first step in taking disputes to court – to the Prime Minister, in which he argued Section 2 of the European Union Act 2011 requires a referendum before the UK can leave the EU.He said the act, which was designed to trigger a referendum in the event of a new EU treaty that would transfer powers to the bloc from the UK, calls for the Government to have a referendum before it can ratify any treaty that amends or replaces the EU or the functioning of the bloc.

Worrying noises out of Brussels from Eurocrats seem to be indicating that Theresa May is softening on Brexit, with EU leaders increasingly confident that she will agree to their demands.The Times note that May has dropped the ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’ line she made earlier this year.The fear will be that a weak negotiating stance will see Britain clobbered financially, with a watered down Brexit that fails to deliver much of what 17.4 million voted for.

EU

The bloc has agreed the basis for negotiations with the UK, says the Independent.

The EU 27 have unanimously agreed their guidelines for the forthcoming negotiations with the UK, in a meeting that lasted “one minute” and ended in spontaneous applause, as the draft guidelines were ratified without a single major alteration.Donald Tusk, the European Council President, said the guidelines had been “adopted unanimously”, adding: “The EU 27 firm and fair political mandate for the Brexit talks is ready.”Meanwhile, the European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said he felt the UK was underestimating the challenges of Brexit.

Brexit negotiations began with a blazing row yesterday as Brussels flatly rejected Theresa May’s negotiating position and accused the prime minister of living in a “parallel reality”.The other 27 EU member states took just four minutes to agree a hardline stance on Brexit at a summit meeting in Brussels before Jean-Claude Juncker, the head of the European Commission, and Michel Barnier, the chief European Union Brexit negotiator, rounded on the prime minister.They told EU leaders that May had used a meeting with them on Wednesday night to demand that a “detailed outline” of a future free trade deal be in place before the UK agrees to pay any money to Brussels as part of the Brexit divorce deal.

European Union leaders endorsed stiff divorce terms for Britain on Saturday and warned Britons to have “no illusions” about swiftly securing a new relationship to keep their access to EU markets.At a Brussels summit marked by unusual harmony among the 27 leaders, there was a flash of the cross-Channel acrimony which some fear could wreck any deal when officials accused London of cynically vetoing some EU spending and demanded it back down or face disrupting the start of talks next month.Meeting for the first time since Prime Minister Theresa May triggered the two-year countdown to Brexit in late March, her counterparts took just minutes as they sat down to lunch in Brussels to approve eight pages of negotiating guidelines hammered out by their diplomats over the past month.

BBC Newssays the EU called on the UK to provide guarantees for its citizens.

European Council President Donald Tusk has called on the UK to come up with a “serious response” on what will happen to EU citizens in Britain after Brexit.“We need guarantees,” he said in Brussels as 27 EU leaders backed the bloc’s Brexit negotiating guidelines.The rights of EU citizens to live, work and study in the UK is one of three topics they want dealt with in the first phase of Brexit talks.Negotiations will start after the UK election on 8 June.Mr Tusk put citizens’ rights centre stage at a news conference after EU leaders – minus UK PM Theresa May – nodded through the guidelines in a matter of minutes.

The European Union has called on Theresa May to provide immediate “serious and real” guarantees to its citizens living in Britain. The EU leaders took just four minutes at a special summit to agree unanimously an uncompromising opening stance in the Brexit negotiations.Leaders said they would not discuss a future trade deal with the British government until “sufficient progress” is made on the issues of Britain’s estimated €60bn divorce bill, the rights of EU nationals in the UK, and the border in Ireland.The European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, told reporters at the special summit in Brussels that EU citizens in Britain were the number one priority, and that he had discussed the need for Britain to now live up to its warm words regarding EU citizens during a dinner with the prime minister in Downing Street last week.

And now it seems we may be forced to pay even more ‘divorce money’, says Breitbart.

The bill for Britain’s Brexit divorce settlement is growing ever longer, with leaders in Brussels now saying that Britain should continue to pick up a portion of the tab for migrants living in Turkey beyond accession.Initial demands that Britain should pay into the European Union’s seven-year Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) until it expires at the end of 2020 – a year after Brexit – have since expanded to include references to “issues resulting from” the budget, as well as those related to the European Investment Bank (EIB) and European Development Fund (EDF).German representatives are now suggesting that “issues” may include the Facility for Refugees, paid to Turkey, which currently stands at some €3 billion, of which €1.5 billion has already been allocated and €777 million spent.

Sky Newsreports a German minister’s words about the final outcome of the talks.

The UK will not have advantages over the remaining 27 EU countries after Brexit negotiations conclude, says Germany’s finance minister.Wolfgang Schaeuble said: “There is no free lunch. Britons must know that.”His comments do not reflect a new position but underline a hardening of tone.“We don’t want to weaken Britain. But we also don’t want that the rest of Europe is weakened,” Mr Schaeuble said.“Britain should not have advantages after the exit, that other countries don’t have.”

The UK government could be ignoring possible problems, says the Express.

BRUSSELS officials today expressed concerns that the Government is burying its head in the sand over the massive complexity of Brexit as the leaders of the remaining 27 member states agreed their guidelines for the negotiations in just four minutes.Senior eurocrats said they had severe doubts that UK ministers truly understood the monumental detail involved in severing ties and raised alarm bells that Britain appeared to be trying to wing the talks by proposing “gentleman’s agreements” on key issues.EU Council chief Donald Tusk delivered a public rebuke to Theresa May this afternoon as he said Brussels had not yet received a “serious response” from Downing Street on citizens’ rights and that public pronouncements of good intentions would not cut the mustard.

The Mailquotes from a Greek former minister’s book that he was forced to agree to austerity.

Greece’s former finance minister claims he was warned by Germany that austerity policies would cripple his country – but he was forced to agree to them anyway.In his new memoir, Yanis Varoufakis claims German finance minister Wolfgang Schauble candidly admitted to him that he would not have endorsed an EU-ordered austerity plan.Varoufakis claimed Schauble told him: ‘It’s bad for your people.’
The former Greek finance minister claims to have secretly recorded his conversations with top figures, and says his experience showed how far Germany was willing to go to protect the single currency.

GE – Conservatives

The latest General Election policies have continued to emerge. The Independentclaims the Tories are surging forward in London and Scotland.

Conservatives have taken the lead over Labour in its traditional strongholds of Scotland and London, a new poll shows.It suggests a surge for the Tories in Scotland, with 27 per cent of support against 16 per cent for Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour. The Scottish National Party (SNP) remains well ahead of both parties.In the 2015 general election, Labour received 24 per cent of the vote, leaving the Conservatives in third place with 15 per cent.The poll by ORB International for The Sunday Telegraph also shows Theresa May’s Conservatives is appealing to voters in other traditional Labour areas, with the Tories now ahead in London.

Theresa May used her first campaign visit to Scotland yesterday to dismiss Nicola Sturgeon’s claim that she would agree another independence referendum if the SNP won on June 8.The Prime Minister refused to support Ms Sturgeon’s suggestion that her opposition to holding another vote on breaking-up Britain will “crumble to dust” if the SNP take most seats north of the border.Mrs May instead said she would only allow a new vote if there was clear evidence that the people of Scotland wanted one – something not currently the case according to polls.

The Tories will promise to do something about the social care crisis, says the Times.

Theresa May will today pledge to put solving Britain’s social care crisis at the heart of her plan for government in her first significant broadcast interview of the campaign. The prime minister will say that a decisive victory on June 8 would allow her to tackle intractable problems that have confronted Britain for decades.The move is an attempt by May to put voters at ease with the idea of a Tory ­landslide. “What she wants from the manifesto is to address not just immediate issues but long-term and complex ­policy areas such as social care, which covers everything from the problems now to generational fairness,” a source close to the prime minister said.

GE – Labour Party

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has conceded he has a fight on his hands to win, says the Independent.

Jeremy Corbyn has admitted he needs to “step up” if Labour is to win the general election, and called on young voters to do the same.“I’ve just laid down the gauntlet and asked you to step up,” he told an audience of students at his former university in east London.“Each and every one of us must step up for this country, including me.”Breaking more than three decades of his own personal convention, Mr Corbyn spoke not just about his policies, but himself.“And now for a sentence I’ve yet to utter in my political life,” he said to a surprised audience at London Metropolitan University. “Enough about you, what about me?”

The party has promised to end zero-hours contracts, reports the Mirror.

Ending zero hours contracts and granting full employment rights from day one are at the core of Labour’s workers charter unveiled tomorrow.Jeremy Corbyn is promising a workplace revolution to give the shop floor more clout.Bosses will no longer be allowed to recruit foreign cheap labour to undercut workers at home.Laws to ensure interns are paid and all workers have the right to be represented by trade unions will be passed if Mr Corbyn becomes PM.Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said: “The next Labour government will bring an end to the rigged economy many experience in Britain’s workplaces.

Labour has pledged to ban all zero-hours contracts, put a halt to unpaid internships and end the pay cap on public sector staff in an unashamedly leftwing pitch to British workers.In a move welcomed by union leaders but that will be attacked as “anti-business” and unaffordable by opponents, the 20-point blueprint also includes commitments to double paid paternity leave to four weeks, increase paternity pay and guarantee temporary and part-time workers the same rights as full-time employees.

The Independentreports that the party is considering where to sell its technology.

Labour has signalled it is looking at new measures to ensure British-built weapons and military technology are not bought by repressive regimes around the world.It comes as the party plans its general election manifesto and following uproar at the Government’s backing for billions of pounds worth of arms sales to Saudi Arabia.Jeremy Corbyn’s push for a more ethical exports policy comes just days after Sir Michael Fallon, the Defence Secretary, praised a UK firm that sold missiles to Colonel Gaddafi as a “role model” for post-Brexit trade.

The Labour Party is facing a revolt among its own activists, who are refusing to back the party’s candidates in the general election in a bid to fight Theresa May’s plans for a hard Brexit.Discussions between Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Green Party are taking place in at least 25 constituencies across the country on ways to vote “tactically”, with enthusiasm for progressive alliances having gained momentum at a local level since the election was announced.In some cases, grassroots members have defied the national party by refusing to select a candidate in their constituency in order to increase the chances for other parties who have a higher chance of winning.Several tactical withdrawals have already been agreed by local Liberal Democrats and Green Party members, while Labour activists in a number of constituencies have decided they will not back their own candidates in order to increase the chances for another progressive candidate in the region.

GE – UKIP

The latest policy from UKIP – to ditch the TV licence and VAT on hot takeaway meals, says the Sun.

UKIP will vow to ditch the TV licence fee and VAT on fish and chips in moves to save the average family £400 a year.The party’s pledges come this week as it makes a big grab for Labour votes.Its election manifesto will include ending green taxes and levies, and scrapping VAT on domestic energy bills, take-away meals and women’s sanitary products.In a major speech, Ukip’s economics spokesman Patrick O’Flynn will declare: “The TV licence has had its day. It is time to axe the TV tax.”His plan will see the hated £147 fee phased out over three years. It would be cut to £100 in the first year, £50 in the second and eliminated by the third.

UKIP will pledge to scrap the TV licence fee as part of a promised £400-a-year windfall for families.The news comes as leader Paul Nuttall announced he is to stand in June’s General Election in Boston and Skegness – a seat that voted overwhelming for Brexit.In a major speech in London this week, economic spokesman Patrick O’Flynn will declare: “It is time to axe the TV tax.Other tax-cutting measures in Ukip’s plan to help ordinary families with living costs will include scrapping green taxes and levies, taking domestic energy bills out of VAT and abolishing VAT on women’s sanitary products and hot takeaway meals such as fish and chips.

Unsurprisingly, the party’s stance on Islam is criticised in the Guardian.

Ukip is facing renewed criticism over its attitudes towards Islam after it emerged that one of its senior MEPs said non-Muslims should have a “perfectly rational fear” of the faith, which he described as a “death cult” steeped in violence.The Liberal Democrats and Greens described the comments, written in a blogpost by Ukip’s Brexit spokesman, Gerard Batten, as “hateful” and “the gutter of British politics”.Asked twice about the issue at the launch of Ukip’s election campaign on Friday, the party’s leader, Paul Nuttall, declined to say whether he agreed with Batten’s views.

GE – LibDems

The main LibDem story in the media today is a possible alliance with former PM Tony Blair, which is reported in the Express.

TONY BLAIR is plotting his political comeback 20 years on from Labour’s historic landslide election victory.The former Prime Minister has had talks with the Liberal Democrats about setting up a new force to fight for the centre ground.He has spoken to Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and his predecessor Nick Clegg about the prospect of creating a pro-European group that would appeal both to Lib Dems and disaffected Labour voters.A source close to Blair said: “He wants to save the Labour Party along with his legacy by wading in behind the Lib Dems and forging a new progressive alliance that will fight for the centre ground.” A source close to Farron has confirmed the talks took place.

Illegal immigration

Outside politics, the Mailclaims illegal immigrants coming through Heathrow have nothing to fear.

Border guards at Heathrow Airport have been secretly told not to waste their time interrogating potential illegal immigrants – because terrorists from Europe pose a greater threat.A leaked memo, seen by The Mail on Sunday, reveals that extremists arriving from the Continent are the ‘number one’ priority.It comes as huge numbers of foreign fighters, including Britons fleeing the crumbling Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, attempt to return to the EU via Turkey.The danger posed by terrorists trying to fly into Britain has been spelt out to Border Force guards at Heathrow by Nick Jariwalla, deputy director of Border Security Command at the airport, in a recent message titled Protecting The Public.

Apocalypse

And as usual, the Sunis warning us that the world as we know it is just about to end.

A CHILLING video has warned of a massive asteroid set to strike our planet – and it’s sooner than you think.A global tsunami and killer earthquakes will destroy Earth on June 23 this year, according to a Christian YouTube channel.The horror claims were uploaded to the video sharing website and say the asteroid will land in the ocean off the coast of Puerto Rico at 2am local time.This comes as it was claimed World War 3 will start in days.With the title “[NOT A HOAX] Urgent Warning to Earth! MASSIVE Asteroid will hit Earth on June 23rd 2017”, it says it is the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.The events will be caused by God and usher forth the end of the world, it adds.Uploaded to YouTube channel End of The World Apocalypse News and Updates, the Christian video claims authorities know what’s coming.It says on its description: “I have some urgent news for you all today, I have just discovered on Nasa’s website that is named 3BC2017 a large asteroid is going to smash right into Earth causing a huge tsunami wave across the Atlantic sea killing millions of citizens around the world.

About The Author

Debbie has been a journalist for longer than she cares to admit! She has been freelance for the last 15 years and is deputy editor on INDEPENDENCE Daily, specialising in covering the morning press each day.

17 Comments

Roger Turner
on April 30, 2017 at 12:35 pm

Has anybody thought of UKIP`s worst nightmare.
Nuttall wins Boston/Skeg.
No other UKIP does
He becomes Leader of the party in the country and in the HOC – Carswell 2
Would he get “short money”?
Is it a big a nightmare as the one Cameron faced when he won the 2015 GE and he had promised a referendum?

citizenkain
on April 30, 2017 at 2:32 pm

If Nuttall wins in Boston we should have there an annual tea party.
This political war we are fighting is bigger and more important than any of us.
The very future of England, Wales, Scotland and Ulster are at stake.
If Boston goes union flag UKIP then we will almost certainly have a small nationalist trend nationwide. The hardest working and most intelligent campaign in all England is taking place 24×7 in Thurrock. Phillip Broughton ought to be offered Harlepool on a silver plate ditto Mick Harold for Stoke Central.
Grimsby, Dudley North, Dagenham, Hornchurch, Thanet South, Clacton, Heywood and Middleton are all winnable with a strong localist campaign.
Yorkshire UKIP should be rising to the challenge to politically decapitate Mary Creagh remainiac labour MP for Wakefield.Wakefielders are hungry for Brexit – as I discovered on my walkabout for eight hours ( you read correctly) when I drove up there early one morning last year to attend the leadership hustings. I went from shop to pub to shop to cafe to people on the street asking them about Brexit.
THAT IS WHY I KNEW NUTTALL HAD LOST IN STOKE ON BYELECTION DAY IN THE BITTER BITTER WIND.

Dee
on April 30, 2017 at 2:40 pm

I have, Roger! But I don’t think he will. When I saw people from that area interviewed after the Election, almost all of them were at great pains to point out that they voted Leave but not UKIP. They may be closet Kippers, but I think the Tories will win big there, so try not to have nightmares! We true Kippers are in a weird situation!

AJAX
on April 30, 2017 at 11:27 am

After a bloody awful start to these elections with that anti-Mohammedan Integrationist amateurish nonsense, UKIP may now be getting back to something a little more serious.

The announcement yesterday the 5 attack policies, with foreign mass migration being at the top of the list; the populist anti-taxation radicalism of calling for the Bolshevik Broadcasting Corporation’s television tax to be abolished along with VAT from fish & chips, are well thought thru & give UKIP some traction now.

#1. GE Campaign: Centrepiece has to be attacking the Liblabcon for the extremism of its foreign mass immigration policy, with American-style attack ads on May, Corbyn & Farron for their support of it. GO FOR THEM personally, get the public antagonistic towards them & what they are, & start seeing UKIP as their electoral weapon to oppose them.

UKIP’s new strategic target must be to do to the rotted Liblabcon political order what it did to the eu.

#2. Councils’ Campaign: Centrepiece should be stopping the out of control fat cat managers looting taxation receipts in their ludicrously greedy salaries.

(Popular & Populist, with a Classical Liberal cutting edge of defending the people from abuse of power by Establishment cliques governmentally operating in their own favour).

Maximus
on April 30, 2017 at 7:53 pm

Ajax. I agree with all of this.

AJAX
on April 30, 2017 at 11:05 pm

Appreciated Maximus, thoughtful of you to say it too.

Hugo
on April 30, 2017 at 9:38 am

Nuttall is entirely counterproductive in my opinion.

Stoke could have been won. Instead his fantasies caught up with him. On the doorstep it was really hard to get past his Hillsborough claims.

It was a strong Brexit area – it should have been won.

Instead he listened to Dr Mahmood and squandered the goodwill of traditional voters by his fantasy of getting 20% of the Muslim vote. Cloud cuckoo land idiocy. It is just not going to happen. Get real.

Now he will ruin the chances of winning in Boston and Skegness.

I am sorry to have to write this. I went three times to help in Stoke, out in the cold wind and rain. So windy a tree blew over where we were campaigning. I wish that I hadn’t bothered.

JackT
on April 30, 2017 at 10:42 am

Hugo,

UKIP simply cannot survive unless Nuttall and his cronies leave and open the way to those who can actually do the job. A few weeks to go and still no manifesto for the GE on the UKIP site.

If the local one is anything to go by they need to employ someone who can manage to produce a clear and succinct document rather that the typical dogs breakfast that we see. They could not survive in a real job.

Dee
on April 30, 2017 at 10:59 am

Hugo I think you are depressingly right. The only thing I’m doing on Twitter is pointing out that if members leave UKIP they won’t be able to vote on…er, anything in the future, and also repeating that May is a Globalist Remainer and where possible, UKIP needs to put the wind up her. Also saying to those who say they won’t vote at all, in that case, if there’s a UKIP candidate in your area, why not tick that box rather than do nothing.
One cannot find anything positive to say about the current fiasco that is the Leadership, all we can do is say look to the future, UKIP must be kept alive. It will be down to members to sort things out after the election, whatever happens, imho.

Hugo
on April 30, 2017 at 11:20 am

Dee, I am considering voting for the Conservatives this time. Effectively this is a second referendum. In my constituency the Lib Dems came a very close second, with UKIP way down. I would prefer a Conservative to a Lib Dem.

In my opinion the UKIP branch should not be fielding a candidate here, because it makes it far more likely that we get a Lib Dem.

AJAX
on April 30, 2017 at 11:30 am

If you vote Tory you vote for May’s foreign mass invasion. Bear that in mind – YOU will be supporting it & giving her the power to do it.

Maximus
on May 1, 2017 at 9:56 am

We need PR so can vote for the party we really want.

Roger Turner
on April 30, 2017 at 11:57 am

Only consider it if the Tory candidate will give an assurance (cast iron guarantee) that he/she is not part of the “chewnastberries” faction?

Hugo
on April 30, 2017 at 12:21 pm

Roger, I spoke with my Conservative MP yesterday. I have it in writing from him that he supports Brexit.

Dee
on April 30, 2017 at 2:34 pm

Hugo, in the other article ‘where is UKIP’s..’ the Tories have been perfectly described, in my book, as TINO’s, that is, Tories in name only. I now firmly believe that May’s strategy is to get as many TINO’s as possible, and, with the rest of the MP’s of all parties behind her, intends to deliver the softest, and worst, Brexit we could ever imagine. Who will oppose? No one in the Commons or the Lords, Remainers to a man and woman.
So your MP ‘would say that, wouldn’t he/she. That said, an even worse option than that is a Liberal MP, so if that’s the case for some of us, me included, we shall just have to bite the bullet. It won’t be a pleasant experience, but to let in our Liberal, and this constituency may well do that anyway, as they are historically Liberal, would be even worse than voting Tory, for me.

Maximus
on April 30, 2017 at 8:03 pm

First past the post leads to tactical voting. I am in favour of PR.

AJAX
on April 30, 2017 at 11:36 am

Coming from a faint-heart who’s wandering around within UKIP’s ranks saying “Vote for Theresa May”, I don’t take this seriously.

Nuttall’s in this election fight now, we have to back him up where we can.

(& Stoke was only missed by 2000 votes, not bad for a constituency that’s been Labour for 70 years).

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